Seeds Will Grow

Cross-posting the following from No Business With Genocide (source):

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For nearly two years, credible investigations, journalists, and humanitarian groups have documented the flow of weapons, supplies, and political support from the United Arab Emirates (UAE) to the Rapid Support Forces (RSF), the militia carrying out mass atrocities and ethnically targeted violence across Sudan. These actions have fueled one of the world’s worst humanitarian crises, including mass displacement, systematic destruction of entire cities, and widespread atrocities that experts warn amount to genocide.

Your actions are having an impact and the UAE government is not happy about it. Through the UAE government–funded Union Association for Human Rights (UAHR), the UAE has even filed a complaint to try to remove our petition to Disney. It is clear that the UAHR is closely linked to the UAE government and does not operate as an independent human-rights organization. With no publicly available financial disclosures or evidence of independent funding, the UAHR functions in practice as a government-aligned entity that advances the state’s narrative rather than providing independent oversight.

The pushback doesn’t stop there. The UAE is also using high-profile sporting events—most recently the Emirates Cup—to polish its global image while atrocities continue. The tournament is marketed as a celebration of international sportsmanship, yet it serves as another distraction from the UAE’s ongoing support for a militia carrying out mass violence in Sudan. These flashy events are not harmless entertainment; they are deliberate tools of sportswashing meant to shift attention away from the suffering of millions of Sudanese civilians.

We cannot let powerful actors silence us! We will not let the UAE intimidate us into abandoning Sudanese people to UAE-supported atrocities.

Today, we’re asking you to take two simple but powerful actions:

1. Sign the petition urging Disney not to support a government implicated in fueling a genocidal campaign
Disney should not build a massive theme park project in a country credibly accused of enabling mass atrocities. The UAE’s defensive response only underscores why public pressure is necessary. Disney is more than a company. It is a cultural institution with global reach, beloved by families and children around the world. When Disney partners with a government, it offers not just economic investment but also legitimacy, visibility, and branding power.

SIGN THE PETITION

2. Sign the Speak Out on Sudan petition to the NBA
In the United States, the NBA promotes itself as an entity committed to promoting equality, inclusion, and human rights. Elsewhere, it puts profits before people. Its partnership with the UAE underscores this hypocrisy. The NBA is letting itself be used as a pawn to distract people from what the UAE is doing in the world. This partnership is not innocent—it is sportswashing, and it hides the suffering of millions of Sudanese people behind a trophy.

TAKE ACTION

Every signature matters. Every share matters. Sudanese communities have been abandoned by the international community, and raising public pressure is one of the few tools we have to push governments and corporations to stop enabling violence.

Thank you for taking action and standing with the people of Sudan. Your voice truly makes a difference.

With solidarity,

Alyson Chadwick, Strategist
Simon Billenness, Executive Director
No Business With Genocide

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